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Friends since the age of six, most of the album was written and recorded by the pair when they were nineteen. The songs possess all the singular magic of a duo writing and playing together while sounding like a full, sonically charged band. Their debut E.P. track 'Two Monkeys', included here, has a level of shoegazey dirt that will leave many distortion freaks reeling. `Every Word Said' is prog-pop perfection. The title track is as moody as anything by Flying Saucer Attack. 'Another One Making Clouds' evolves over 35 minutes and doesn't stop elevating and surprising. A founding notion of our label was to release recordings made as the musicians' first intended. No `notes' and no re-recording with a `proper' producer in a `real' studio. A noble preference we saw labels like Rough Trade pursuing with The Strokes, The Smiths, The Fall et al.This album is a proud example. And captures something you can't fake. A young band finding an epic, emotional, cinematic sound in their bedroom. Using it in that peculiarly British way to express the wonder, confusion and heartache of being nineteen. Of wanting to be seen and not seen. It's a kind of British `soul' music with ancestors like The Cure, Echo & The Bunnymen, The Jesus & Mary Chain and the original shoegaze bands. Progressive guitar music, channeling deep emotion, a desire to hear something that sounds like how you feel inside. The stuff nobody talks about. Everything Else.

Friends since the age of six, most of the album was written and recorded by the pair when they were nineteen. The songs possess all the singular magic of a duo writing and playing together while sounding like a full, sonically charged band. Their debut E.P. track 'Two Monkeys', included here, has a level of shoegazey dirt that will leave many distortion freaks reeling. `Every Word Said' is prog-pop perfection. The title track is as moody as anything by Flying Saucer Attack. 'Another One Making Clouds' evolves over 35 minutes and doesn't stop elevating and surprising. A founding notion of our label was to release recordings made as the musicians' first intended. No `notes' and no re-recording with a `proper' producer in a `real' studio. A noble preference we saw labels like Rough Trade pursuing with The Strokes, The Smiths, The Fall et al.This album is a proud example. And captures something you can't fake. A young band finding an epic, emotional, cinematic sound in their bedroom. Using it in that peculiarly British way to express the wonder, confusion and heartache of being nineteen. Of wanting to be seen and not seen. It's a kind of British `soul' music with ancestors like The Cure, Echo & The Bunnymen, The Jesus & Mary Chain and the original shoegaze bands. Progressive guitar music, channeling deep emotion, a desire to hear something that sounds like how you feel inside. The stuff nobody talks about. Everything Else.

Mobile Fidelity's UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP Set Plays with Authoritative Tonality, Airiness, and Clarity:
Pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl and Strictly Limited to
3,000 Numbered Copies
1/4” / 15 IPS Dolby A analogue master to DSD 256 to analogue console to lathe

Joni Mitchell is the only artist who could’ve made Hejira. The legendary singer-songwriter said as much when discussing the album decades after its release. Yet that fact seemed obvious from the moment the gold-certified effort streeted in fall 1976. An adventurous travelogue, probing narrative, and offbeat homage to freedom, Hejira remains an inimitable entry in the catalog of recorded music — a spare, gorgeous, meditative series of sonic vignettes comprised of floating harmonic pop, cool jazz, soft rock, and sensitive vocal elements that beckon feelings of motion, discovery, and self-examination.

Sourced from the original analog master tapes, pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing on MoFi SuperVinyl, and strictly limited to 3,000 numbered copies, Mobile Fidelity's UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP set presents the record ranked the 133rd Greatest of All Time by Rolling Stone with definitive detail, richness, accuracy, and directness. Marking the first time the revered LP has received audiophile treatment, it's one of six iconic 1970s Mitchell records Mobile Fidelity is reissuing on vinyl and SACD.

Playing with a virtually nonexistent noise floor, dead-quiet surfaces, and superior groove definition, this collectible reissue reproduces in enveloping fashion the tones, textures, and craftsmanship that help Hejira function as the equivalent of a liberating trip down an open road with nothing but blue sky, natural landscape, and fresh air in the immediate vicinity. Passages bloom, carry, decay as they do amid an acoustically optimized environment. Soundstages extend far, wide, and deep, with black backgrounds and pinpoint images adding to the realism.

The reference-grade immediacy, airiness, and presence put in transparent perspective Mitchell’s dense strings of words, stream-of-conscious-like phrasing, and unhurried albeit forward momentum. Likewise, the instrumental contributions of her A-list support musicians — a cast that includes L.A. Express members John Guerin, Max Bennett and Tom Scott, plus Neil Young, Victor Feldman, and Abe Most — emerges with breathtaking clarity and dimensionality.

While Mitchell, whose intimate vocals and abstract guitar parts center everything, Mobile Fidelity's restoration of Hejira further reveals the visionary breadth of guitarist Larry Carlton and bassist Jaco Pastorius. Though heard on only four tracks, Pastorius' fretless bass epitomizes the fluid, subtle, flexible, roomy, and shape-shifting characteristics of songs that often appear to transpire out of nowhere akin to the formation of a puffy cumulus cloud overhead. In sync with Mitchell’s voice, Pastorius’ fusion hovers and floats, suspended in a fog you want to deeply inhale. The "grace notes" Mitchell desired on Hejira can now be heard in full. Ditto the luxurious tapestries of alinear lines, fills, and supplements unreeled on Carlton’s six-string.

Visually, the packaging of this UD1S set complements its identity as the copy to own. Housed in a deluxe slipcase, the LPs come in foil-stamped jackets with faithful-to-the-original graphics. This version is for listeners who desire to become immersed in everything about Hejira, including the unforgettable album cover — a pastiche of 14 different photos Mitchell used a Camera Lucida to assemble into one image that’s anchored by a portrait of her in a stoic pose — and the interior shots of Mitchell skating on a frozen Wisconsin lake wearing a pair of black skates, black shirt, and fur cape.

The notion of skating, feeling an awakening wind whipping against your face, and losing yourself to the surroundings are extremely apt for Hejira, which Mitchell wrote after a sequence of trips and relationships prompted her to reflect on the complicated conflicts between independence and marriage, success and satisfaction, duty and desire — and, more specifically, “the cost of being a woman.” The Canadian native delved into such themes before. But never as she does on Hejira, whose liberating, running-away aura doubles as another of Mitchell’s rejections of tradition as well as a suggestion of a better alternative.

At once observational and personal, expansive and insular, cheerful and poignant, Hejira spans a sea of human conditions, emotions, and circumstances. It addresses drifting, isolation, pleasure, place, time, and surroundings with strikingly poetic discourse matched with music that, save for the crooned ballad “Blue Motel Room,” forgoes conventional structures and choruses.

The jazz-based arrangements, marked by scaled-down percussion and all manner of bent, rounded, and unsettled notes, hint that Mitchell has no exact destination in mind. Excursions such as the moody “Furry Sings the Blues,” funky “Coyote” and edgy “Black Crow” throw open previously locked doors to possibility and journey. They signal it’s time for a welcome departure from norms and the past, one that leads to a heightened sense of clarity and perspective. Or, as Mitchell said upon choosing the album title, it’s time for “leaving the dream, no blame.”

Zum 40. Jubiläum von Modern Talking überrascht Sänger Thomas Anders mit einem ganz speziellen Album-Projekt: Eine Hommage an Modern Talking!

Zum 40. Jubiläum von Modern Talking überrascht der Sänger mit Neuaufnahmen der ersten sechs Modern-Talking-Alben und ist somit der erste deutsche Künstler überhaupt, der sein komplettes Frühwerk neu interpretiert! Seit 2003 geht das erfolgreichste Duo der deutschen Popgeschichte bekanntlich getrennte Wege, doch die Modern Talking Songs, zu denen man bis heute in aller Welt tanzt, bleiben nach wie vor weltweit unsterblich.

Die Neuaufnahmen der ersten Modern-Talking-Alben sind mit seiner unverwechselbaren Stimme eine Hommage an das einzigartige Erfolgsduo und an die glorreiche, vermeintlich bunte und sorgenfreie Zeit Mitte der Achtzigerjahre. Die einst vom pulsierenden Italo-Disco-Sound inspirierten Songs sind alle auf Anhieb zu erkennen, klingen jetzt aber dank modernerer Drums und Synths zeitgemäßer. Zusätzlich erscheint das 6-Album-Paket erstmals im Dolby-Atmos Sound, also 3D-Audio. Auf jedem Album überrascht Thomas Anders außerdem mit zwei bislang unveröffentlichten Songs, etwa “Don’t Fly Too High“ oder “Hold Me Tight In The Night“ auf dem ersten Album. Versierte Studiomusiker haben alle Stücke zusammen mit Thomas Anders unter der Ägide von Christian Geller komplett neu eingespielt, begleitet wird Anders dabei übrigens von denselben Chorsängerinnen und Sängern, die schon damals auf den Originalaufnahmen zu hören waren. Bei der Produktion wurden Spuren aus der Originalproduktion so detailgetreu wie möglich neu produziert und den neuen Versionen hinzugemischt.

Die sechs Alben – “The 1st Album“, “Let's Talk About Love“, “Ready For Romance“, “In The Middle Of Nowhere“, “Romantic Warriors“ und “In The Garden Of Venus“, auf denen alle großen Modern-Talking-Hits der 80er vertreten sind – erscheinen ab März 2025 in regelmäßigen Abständen bis Ende des Jahres beim Label Stars by Edel. Zum 40. Jubiläum von Modern Talking kommt es jetzt also einmal ganz Anders ...

Alice is a vocal harmony trio made up of three persons, joined by a cheap synth and limited virtuosity. Together, they craft a kind of future folklore that’s part funny, part apocalyptic — half-soft, half-harsh, half-sad, half-simple, half-complex, half-controlled, half-Yvonne Harder, half-Sarah André, half-Lisa Harder.

Since their last album L’Oiseau Magnifique, Alice have spent time on the road — in cars, in trains, out in the open. Accustomed to writing outdoors, they slowly stitched together a collection of new songs. After two years of performing in clubs, bars, stairwells, carpentry workshops, activist agricultural fairs and roadside shoulders, they took their Oiseau Magnifique just about everywhere. It felt like time to sew these new pieces together — a quilt of humour and soft words, something we could really use in these half-sweet, half-fascist times.

Les Châteaux Faibles is the name of one of their latest songs, and naturally, the title of their new album. It captures the group’s ethos perfectly — a search for refuge in fragility, in a weakness that’s better when shared. A collective sensitivity to bring us closer, stronger — united in our Châteaux Faibles.

With a room fulla fine pickers and a set of Hollywood orchestral cues to kill for, Cory Hanson proclaims I Love People! His 4th solo album drills down (baby) on a dryly parallax worldview, with songs about all those people he loves and all the crazy things they get up to. As ringmaster for a circus show of classic folk and rock tropes, Cory tugs at our heartstrings with expert misdirection, embracing tradition by throwing it out, into the wind.

With a room fulla fine pickers and a set of Hollywood orchestral cues to kill for, Cory Hanson proclaims I Love People! His 4th solo album drills down (baby) on a dryly parallax worldview, with songs about all those people he loves and all the crazy things they get up to. As ringmaster for a circus show of classic folk and rock tropes, Cory tugs at our heartstrings with expert misdirection, embracing tradition by throwing it out, into the wind.

Subconsciousology is a full reworking of Dot Allison's 2023's Consciousology, by producer Lomond Campbell, who, as the title suggests, has made it deeper, darker and dancier. Whereas the original album was all ornate avant-garde folk and psychedelic explorations, this new take is as hard-hitting as it is heavenly, as beat-driven as it is beautiful, and crucially it finds Dot re-embracing the electronic music with which she first made her name in One Dove. "I love that Lomond has brought a rich musicality and has created wild universes around the elements he has chosen to retain in the various songs," adds Dot. "It reminds me of working with Andrew Weatherall in a way, where the mixes were bold and reinventive departures. "The whole concept of the original record is about interconnectivity and the electromagnetic aspects to consciousness, so the remixed version is like a rainbow diffracted from a beam of light." Everything in this pot of gold sounds and feels at once familiar but different - from the chugg This vinyl LP is of Pollination Splatter colour

Between The Seed And The Timber is a cycle of six songs exploring ritual and mystical aspects of the modern era. At times both noir and psychedelic, they evoke a strong sense of nostalgia for a disappearing age. In contrast to industrial music’s dystopian semiotics, Jas Shaw challenges us to hear sounds inspired by machinery, electricity and mechanisation in a new light.

“I made the synth parts for a Swans gig,” says Shaw. “As SMD we’d supported Swans. James was away doing some production but I didn’t want to pass it up, so I offered to open solo. It turned out the gig was sooner than expected so I made all these synth things to do live.”

Shaw put the tracks to one side and forgot about them, only returning to them years later. “You know when you’ve changed as a person and you listen back to something from a different angle? I suddenly could hear what I had been after. It reminded me of experiences I’d had at Swans gigs. I wanted to achieve that energy and charge.”

Dubbing techniques are crucial to the sound of the record. “I set up a few synths on a table and had my mixer running loads of auxes back into the desk so it was all on the edge of feeding back. Then I realised that if I put a mic into the desk I’d have an extra feedback route. I found a setting where I could get it to build when I pointed the mic at the monitors but then turning it away you could put the brakes on the regen.”

Between The Seed And The Timber is Jas Shaw’s inaugural release for the London based, Kindred-affiliated TEETH label. TEETH is rooted in a reverence for texture, space, and sonic decay - amplifying experimental sounds that blend dreamlike melodies with weathered landscapes. Each release informs the next, with every track as vital as the last to complete the whole set.

Orchestrated by Jojo Mathiszig-Lee, founder of London’s Kindred, the label celebrates like-minded talent from the community, providing a platform for transgressing music.

Artworks are made by Scarlet Griffiths.

The Time Capsule label unites record collectors and DJs of Brilliant Corners and Beauty & The Beat communities in London. For each release, Kay Suzuki works alongside one co-curator to reinstate and repackage the music they hold dear into perfectly restored historic artifacts.

For the first release, Brilliant Corners regular and Meda Fury signing Ryota OPP curates the reissue of Il Guardiano Del Faro’s 1978 album Oasis.

Born 1940 in Milan, Federico Monti Arduini was a child prodigy who studied piano and was already performing at concerts from the age of eight. He composed pop songs for other artists which sold millions of copies, but his own solo success came after he encountered synthesizers in the early 70s.

Viewed as a precursor of New Age sound art, Arduini was one of the first producers in Italy to use the Moog synthesizer and a meeting with Bob Moog in New York only added to this obsession. He was also an early adopter of the tradition among electronic producers to use a moniker to disguise his identity. Il Guardiano Del Faro (translated as “the guardian of lighthouse”) is a nod to the small Italian fishing town Porto Santo Stefano, where Arduini created his studio in the mid-70s.

He produced a number of albums from this seaside idyl of electronic instruments and tape recorders, but Oasis stands out from the pack. Released in 1978, it became a cult classic for its experimental sounds and emotional expressions. Spiritual synth sounds cover the album in a dreamy haze, oscillating between ambient and psychedelic. Sparing deployment of the Roland rhythm box gives dance floor favourites ‘Disco Divina’ and ‘Oasis’ touches of space disco and even teases proto-house elements like the great Sun Palace.

“The passionate, sweet and dramatic sound of Il Guardiano Del Faro made me fantasise about so many romantic aspects of Italian culture. Oasis is sonically more interesting than his other albums and these exotic, eccentric rhythms sound quite familiar to the modern music fans.” – Ryota OPP

‘Moiré’ is the second album by French musician and singer Charlotte Leclerc. Charlotte's songs are like those little details of everyday life that you discover when you slow down the pace of your busy day. She uses the sound of her machines to tell us about human relationships. Relationships between two people and universal relationships. The ones that connect us all and make this planet run a little more smoothly.

Best of' albums are invariably repackaged collections of old recordings, so Vice Squad's `Punk Rockers' is a breath of fresh air The songs have been lovingly recorded and remastered, keeping all the original fire and adding decades of experience gained from punishing tours and continuous songwriting Beki is the original architect of the songs and the Vice Squad name, and she is the sole surviving member of the original lineup to have continued as a full-time musician Vice Squad are 100% DIY and record everything in their home studio with guitarist/riffmaster Paul Rooney engineering and mixing. There is nothing sloppy here; the whole album is concise and intelligent with lightning-speed diction, passion, and intent. The glorious `If I Knew What I Know Now' and `The World Is Wrong' are examples of Vice Squad's ability to write instantly catchy, witty songs, and the more gut-wrenching material from their last album, `Battle of Britain', showcases some enormous riffs and a voice that is a million decibels from Beki's untried teen vocals. The album opens with the deliciously effervescent `If I Knew What I Know Now', followed by the sparkling old-school tongue-twister `Out of Reach'. Next up is the visceral `Get A Life', an angry anti-suicide note to the desperate, originally the title track from their 1998 comeback album. This is followed by a shimmering version of Vice Squad's old-school classic `Resurrection'. While the treatment of the old songs remains true to the original teenage renditions, the upgraded versions pack more of a punch with detuned guitars and growling bass. The tribal tom-toms of `Allergy' underpin just over two minutes of punk protest about the delights of pollution and asthma. Then comes the sublime `Sniffing Glue', a near-perfect punk love song that would be a huge hit if not for its subject matter. `Ordinary Girl' is punk-pop perfection brimming with hook lines and harmonies, warmly mocking the life that could have been chosen instead of the grindstone at the sharp end of the music industry. `The World Is Wrong' is anthemic, joyous, and wonderfully contrary, and one would expect nothing less from a band that has soldiered on and grown through the decades. It's always great when bands lead by example. In these increasingly tough times where our survival is threatened by the gargantuan greed of a few individuals, it's important to continuously stick two fingers up to the grabbers and spoilers. 'The World Is Wrong' does just that in an impassioned, melodic, and optimistic style. 'Hold your head up, stand your ground, and don't let the bastards grind you down.' Then we roar into the final single Beki wrote with original and now sadly deceased guitarist Dave Bateman, `Citizen', and continue with another teenage opus, the quite brutal `Scarred For Life'. `Voice of the People' is a bulldozer of a song, all swagger and ballsy riffs, and the chorus, `Freedom of speech is against the law; now we're all criminals,' snarls its derision at red-handed red tape. `Punk Police' sneers over a catchy-as-COVID guitar riff, and the lyrics, `Regulation cut, you must measure up, down on the street, PR companies, monied families, running the scene,' call out the hierarchies that now permeate Punk. Baritone guitars add extra darkness to one of the first-ever animal rights songs, `Humane', and I'm struck by how relevant the older songs are. Chocks away, and the awesome 'Spitfire' takes flight like Motörhead on extra amphetamines. Merlin engines fade into `Born In A War', the second in the triumvirate of conflict-themed songs, an absolute stonker with huge muscular riffs and lyrics that roar pure outrage. Then comes the ominous Last Rockers, with all the angst of the original plus added depth and resonance. Beki: ' "Last Rockers" is a typically depressive adolescent song about nuclear war and being too young to die but too late to live. I believed Punks were the `Last Rockers', the final youth cult before the Apocalypse. I was obsessed with punk, and all I wanted to do was sing in a band and be part of the movement, so I would often romanticise the idea of punk in my lyrics.'

Best of' albums are invariably repackaged collections of old recordings, so Vice Squad's `Punk Rockers' is a breath of fresh air The songs have been lovingly recorded and remastered, keeping all the original fire and adding decades of experience gained from punishing tours and continuous songwriting Beki is the original architect of the songs and the Vice Squad name, and she is the sole surviving member of the original lineup to have continued as a full-time musician Vice Squad are 100% DIY and record everything in their home studio with guitarist/riffmaster Paul Rooney engineering and mixing. There is nothing sloppy here; the whole album is concise and intelligent with lightning-speed diction, passion, and intent. The glorious `If I Knew What I Know Now' and `The World Is Wrong' are examples of Vice Squad's ability to write instantly catchy, witty songs, and the more gut-wrenching material from their last album, `Battle of Britain', showcases some enormous riffs and a voice that is a million decibels from Beki's untried teen vocals. The album opens with the deliciously effervescent `If I Knew What I Know Now', followed by the sparkling old-school tongue-twister `Out of Reach'. Next up is the visceral `Get A Life', an angry anti-suicide note to the desperate, originally the title track from their 1998 comeback album. This is followed by a shimmering version of Vice Squad's old-school classic `Resurrection'. While the treatment of the old songs remains true to the original teenage renditions, the upgraded versions pack more of a punch with detuned guitars and growling bass. The tribal tom-toms of `Allergy' underpin just over two minutes of punk protest about the delights of pollution and asthma. Then comes the sublime `Sniffing Glue', a near-perfect punk love song that would be a huge hit if not for its subject matter. `Ordinary Girl' is punk-pop perfection brimming with hook lines and harmonies, warmly mocking the life that could have been chosen instead of the grindstone at the sharp end of the music industry. `The World Is Wrong' is anthemic, joyous, and wonderfully contrary, and one would expect nothing less from a band that has soldiered on and grown through the decades. It's always great when bands lead by example. In these increasingly tough times where our survival is threatened by the gargantuan greed of a few individuals, it's important to continuously stick two fingers up to the grabbers and spoilers. 'The World Is Wrong' does just that in an impassioned, melodic, and optimistic style. 'Hold your head up, stand your ground, and don't let the bastards grind you down.' Then we roar into the final single Beki wrote with original and now sadly deceased guitarist Dave Bateman, `Citizen', and continue with another teenage opus, the quite brutal `Scarred For Life'. `Voice of the People' is a bulldozer of a song, all swagger and ballsy riffs, and the chorus, `Freedom of speech is against the law; now we're all criminals,' snarls its derision at red-handed red tape. `Punk Police' sneers over a catchy-as-COVID guitar riff, and the lyrics, `Regulation cut, you must measure up, down on the street, PR companies, monied families, running the scene,' call out the hierarchies that now permeate Punk. Baritone guitars add extra darkness to one of the first-ever animal rights songs, `Humane', and I'm struck by how relevant the older songs are. Chocks away, and the awesome 'Spitfire' takes flight like Motörhead on extra amphetamines. Merlin engines fade into `Born In A War', the second in the triumvirate of conflict-themed songs, an absolute stonker with huge muscular riffs and lyrics that roar pure outrage. Then comes the ominous Last Rockers, with all the angst of the original plus added depth and resonance. Beki: ' "Last Rockers" is a typically depressive adolescent song about nuclear war and being too young to die but too late to live. I believed Punks were the `Last Rockers', the final youth cult before the Apocalypse. I was obsessed with punk, and all I wanted to do was sing in a band and be part of the movement, so I would often romanticise the idea of punk in my lyrics.'

Vice Squad are 100% DIY and record everything in their home studio with guitarist/riffmaster Paul Rooney engineering and mixing. There is nothing sloppy here; the whole album is concise and intelligent with lightning-speed diction, passion, and intent. The glorious ‘If I Knew What I Know Now’ and ‘The World Is Wrong’ are examples of Vice Squad’s ability to write instantly catchy, witty songs, and the more gut-wrenching material from their last album, ‘Battle of Britain’, showcases some enormous riffs and a voice that is a million decibels from Beki's untried teen vocals. The album opens with the deliciously effervescent ‘If I Knew What I Know Now’, followed by the sparkling old-school tongue-twister ‘Out of Reach’. Next up is the visceral ‘Get A Life’, an angry anti-suicide note to the desperate, originally the title track from their 1998 comeback album. This is followed by a shimmering version of Vice Squad's old-school classic ‘Resurrection’. While the treatment of the old songs remains true to the original teenage renditions, the upgraded versions pack more of a punch with detuned guitars and growling bass. The tribal tom-toms of ‘Allergy’ underpin just over two minutes of punk protest about the delights of pollution and asthma. Then comes the sublime ‘Sniffing Glue’, a near-perfect punk love song that would be a huge hit if not for its subject matter. ‘Ordinary Girl’ is punk-pop perfection brimming with hook lines and harmonies, warmly mocking the life that could have been chosen instead of the grindstone at the sharp end of the music industry. ‘The World Is Wrong’ is anthemic, joyous, and wonderfully contrary, and one would expect nothing less from a band that has soldiered on and grown through the decades. It’s always great when bands lead by example. In these increasingly tough times where our survival is threatened by the gargantuan greed of a few individuals, it's important to continuously stick two fingers up to the grabbers and spoilers. 'The World Is Wrong' does just that in an impassioned, melodic, and optimistic style. 'Hold your head up, stand your ground, and don't let the bastards grind you down.' Then we roar into the final single Beki wrote with original and now sadly deceased guitarist Dave Bateman, ‘Citizen’, and continue with another teenage opus, the quite brutal ‘Scarred For Life’. ‘Voice of the People’ is a bulldozer of a song, all swagger and ballsy riffs, and the chorus, ‘Freedom of speech is against the law; now we’re all criminals,’ snarls its derision at red-handed red tape. ‘Punk Police’ sneers over a catchy-as-COVID guitar riff, and the lyrics, ‘Regulation cut, you must measure up, down on the street, PR companies, monied families, running the scene,’ call out the hierarchies that now permeate Punk. Baritone guitars add extra darkness to one of the first-ever animal rights songs, ‘Humane’, and I’m struck by how relevant the older songs are. Chocks away, and the awesome ’Spitfire’ takes flight like Motörhead on extra amphetamines. Merlin engines fade into ‘Born In A War’, the second in the triumvirate of conflict-themed songs, an absolute stonker with huge muscular riffs and lyrics that roar pure outrage. Then comes the ominous Last Rockers, with all the angst of the original plus added depth and resonance. Beki: ' "Last Rockers" is a typically depressive adolescent song about nuclear war and being too young to die but too late to live. I believed Punks were the ‘Last Rockers’, the final youth cult before the Apocalypse. I was obsessed with punk, and all I wanted to do was sing in a band and be part of the movement, so I would often romanticise the idea of punk in my lyrics.' The four bonus CD tracks kick off with ‘Coward’, another teen Bateman/Bond composition. ‘No You Don’t’ is just over two minutes of vocal acrobatics over a Dexedrine-driven Devo-esque chord sequence, and the frantically brilliant ‘I Dare To Breathe’ from ‘Battle of Britain’ continues the aural assault. Then the final sombre entreaty of ‘You Can’t Buy Back The Dead’ warns us that ‘Enough’s never enough; absolute power will corrupt; the war machine still rumbles on’ before fading into the future.

Carrying on the long tradition of sentimental jangle pop songwriters, Lightheaded distil decades of lovelorn tunes into sounds for modern softies. They have the sunshine sparkle of The Left Banke and Margo Guryan, the C86 charm of Dolly Mixture and Would-Be-Goods, and the cinematic swell of Belle & Sebastian and Camera Obscura. Formed on the shore of New Jersey in 2017 by Cynthia Rittenbach and Stephen Stec, Lightheaded took time to hone their sound with a rotating crew of drummers, guitarists and backup vocalists. They found a community of like-minded bands in a vast but tight-knit international indie pop scene, which eventually led them to the iconic California label Slumberland Records. Their debut cassette EP Good Good Great!, a collection of five perfect pop songs, landed in 2023, followed by the full-length Combustible Gems in 2024. A European tour and gigs opening for bands like Heavenly, The Softies and The Ladybug Transistor rounded out their breakout year. Thinking, Dreaming, Scheming is their most collaborative and earnest release to date. A side of five brand new songs is combined with the five tracks from Good Good Great!, now available on vinyl for the first time. Recorded bi-coastally with Gary Olson (The Ladybug Transistor) and Alicia Vanden Heuvel (The Aislers Set, Poundsign) and drenched in lush reverb on tape by Fred Thomas (Saturday Looks Good to Me), the new songs are rendered in a dreamy soft focus that perfectly suits their starry-eyed themes. Adding to all the fun are the cameos and contributions from the new generation of New York indie pop goodness, featuring members of Starcleaner Reunion and Trinket, pushing the songs on this record to a high point in the young band's discography. There is something unusual about this band - something truly special.

"Against all odds!" ETERNAL DARKNESS bass player since 2019 Jeff Hausel knows what he's talking about. It took this cult death/doom Swedish mob thirty-five years to finally come up with their first proper album, only to see them splitting on the eve of its official release on Pulverised Records. But make no mistake: formed way back in Eskilstuna, Sweden in 1990 and revered ever since as one of Scandinavia most uncompromised death/doom entity ever, their self-titled full-length - produced, recorded and mixed by longtime friend and CRYPT OF KERBEROS/TYRANT guitar player Peter Bjärgö in their former rehearsal room - is probably the heaviest, as in HEAVIEST, thing you'll hear this year. Joining for the occasion the original members Make Pesonen (drums) and Janne Heikkinen (vocals) are John Carlsson on lead guitar (ETERNAL AUTUMN), Kristian Henriksson on rhythm guitar (UNPURE, SVARTSYN) and Jeff Hausel on bass. Eight brand new songs, written in between 2019 and 2024, marked by personal tragedy and about "the process of death, loss and grief", completed by the aptly chosen famous Italian 14th century tapestry, Triumph Of Death. Maybe their last move but talk about leaving with a bang. In Death!

Bruch once again proves to be a grim and bighearted crooner and multi-layered genre-bender between repetitive pulsating electronic music and brilliant organ minimalism, between destructive rock'n'roll and world-embracing pop. Bruch is Philipp Hanich's alter ego as a music producer. Born and raised in Munich / Germany, he has been living and working in Vienna / Austria as a visual artist and musician for 20 years now. He is equipped with a long pedigree of DIY-counterculture, gathered since the early 2000s whilst touring with different bands, creating off-spaces and co-running the labels Totally Wired Records (2012-2016) and Cut Surface (since 2016). The Harbour of the Broken Hearted (THOTBH) can be a state of mind, ramshackle but transcendent. Oscillating between the repetitive pulses of electronic music and organ-orchestrated minimalism, Bruch throws out comforting loops of sound just like fishing nets, that suck you into his stories unwaveringly. His evocative and unadorned vocal style adds to Bruch's depth, soul and sincerity. Drifting and driven amidst uplifting gloom. At times, solemnly striding against foggy and dogmatic black-and-white-thinking, rearing up in opulent resistance, then again just hopelessly beautiful and achingly wistful. Occasionally, Bruch's laid-back observations can also end in a wild ride. By introducing The Crusher, Bruch enters the harbour with full sails of self-reflexion - and we realize, sometimes it's all just about having to endure yourself. Or_ is it all about love? In the end, each and every of THOTBH's songs turns out to have a cathartic quality. Bruch's THOTBH might not be a safe space, but it accepts us as we are. With our doubts, our own frailties and our shortcomings. No need for embarrassment within the fragile. No need for shame and fear in expression. No need to shy away from creating something beautiful. You better learn to spell ,Sehnsucht" - as it turns out to be the everlasting keyword!

“My hero’s back,” Madeline Kenney sings on the second track of her newest effort, Kiss from the Balcony. In a sense, she means herself; made with friends Ben Sloan and Stephen Patota across just a few in-person studio sessions in Oakland, these tracks represent a culmination of Madeline’s musings on growth and resilience reaching back years, brought to life through this generative and vibrant collaboration. Close listeners can hear the breadth of stylistic elements and themes carried through from various eras of her work, which all come together in a cohesive and timeless record.

In two week-long intensive sessions, the three collaborators grew these nine songs from fragments, sketches, and seeds. With a background in experimental percussion and sound design, Ben Sloan brings an electronic sound to Kenney’s writing; Stephen Patota provides ingenious guitar melodies throughout and grounds the project in acoustic elements. Kiss from the Balcony was originally intended to be an EP, but the sessions brought forth such fruitful ideation and play that the project was expanded to a full length album. It sits in Madeline’s discography as a thematic and musical progression that sees her iterate on ideas about love and explore new sonic motifs through her work with Patota and Sloan.

Much of Kiss from the Balcony is a meditation on modern relationships, a feminist and utterly human contemplation of power and who holds it. “Hereditary backward leaning,” she describes in ‘Slap,’ of the female condition; “But no-one ever likes to see the girls break down / So they keep it to the bathroom floor” she sings in the rapturous opener, ‘Scoop.’ While the songs are shrouded in metaphor, the ubiquity of heartbreak and resilience decode much of the internal conflict Kenney depicts. The album sees her recognize the precarity and peculiarity of life and take it by the horns, realizing she controls her own narrative:


She explores the relationships between joy and suffering, choosing to see them as inseparable, two sides of a single coin. “It’s never over / When will they love me?” Kenney asks on ‘They Go Wide,’ describing her positionality both as a woman in relationship and as an indie artist in the modern music industry.

A playful hopefulness pervades the record, providing a sense of revelation in the journey throughout, Kenney’s radical acceptance of life as it is like a lyrical tongue out at the absurd.

SASSYHIYA want to take you somewhere. The journey starts in Kathy and Helen's flat in South London. Sit down, close your eyes, and immerse yourself... You are on your way to a musical rainforest a long way from Camberwell. Explore your new surroundings, and you will find beautiful pop blooms like Let's See What We Can Find, as bright and vibrant as The Sundays, thrusting their colourful faces up from the forest floor. You'll find tangles of sharp-edged guitar, as if Swiss she-punks Kleenex had been left to evolve here in the rich fertile soil (I Had A Thought). You'll find dark pools full of lyrical complexity, deceptively deep and immersive, with shimmering reflections of The Go-Betweens (Perennial). And you'll come across delicate love songs, creeping up the trunks and branches of the bass and drums, displaying their fragile beauty (Thank You And Goodbye). And what's that exotic striped animal prowling through the undergrowth? Actually, it's Crayon Potato, Sassyhiya's pet cat, the other resident of their flat in South London, taking up her role as the feline star of a lilting, singalong anthem written in her honour. That's what is so great about this album. You are somehow, simultaneously, exploring the most exotic forest in the world while also sitting in a flat in an ordinary, familiar English street with Sassyhiya and their cat. This album transports you without pretending the real world doesn't exist: it doesn't get all mystical on you (Take You Somewhere is as unlike Enya as anything you've heard). Sometimes you might be reminded of Girls At Our Best, and then Delta 5. You might even, on occasion, think of Echo and the Bunnymen. Sassyhiya (pronounced "Sassy Hiya") were formed when Helen and Kathy, real-life partners and co-songwriters, joined up with Pablo and Neil (drums and guitar). Helen had previously been in Boys Forever and Basic Plumbing, collaborating with much-missed Veronica Falls musician Patrick Doyle. She and Kathy then formed Barry, a stripped-down queercore outfit, with Bart McDonagh (The Male Gays) and Mark Amura (My Executive Dysfunction). Sassyhiya feels like a culmination of all these elements, hitting the sweet spot between post-punk and indie pop. They know their way around a melody but still keep it wonky, with influences ranging from the Breeders and Broadcast to Dolly Parton.

It was in such a dense and impenetrable darkness that Lake of Tears must have been
born.
And their debut album is immersed in this darkness. It was baptized "Greater Art" and
indeed the title sets the tone for what was to follow. Yes, it is a higher art, it was and is
something different. Although there are infuences from other Swedish bands of the
time, such as Tiamat, or even death metal elements, what is certain is that their doom
metal brought to the fore something new, fresh and completely innovative.
We won't go into the process of choosing any songs, as we've said it before, Lake of
Tears never included indifferent compositions on any album. However, we can't help
but make a small exception when talking about the magnifcent epic " Upon The
Highest Mountain ", which in itself would be an excellent reason to purchase the
album.
We are proud to release Lake of Tears ' debut on vinyl after 31 years. For the older
generation to remember and the younger generation to discover. Because what these
Swedes made here, three decades ago, stands as an immortal monument. Is it doom
metal? Does it have death metal infuences? Is it gothic metal? Yes, but it sounds a bit
different...Who really cares?
It was then that the magnifcent prologue was written, becoming the beginning of
everything that was to follow. And hold on... the epilogue hasn't been written yet...

Pelican has always been a band that's not just from Chicago, but distinctly of Chicago. Formed in 2000 by guitarists Trevor Shelley de Brauw and Laurent Schroeder-Lebec alongside brothers Bryan and Larry Herweg on bass and drums respectively, Pelican's foundation was built upon the rule-free, genre-agnostic scene synonymous with the Fireside Bowl. "The `90s in Chicago was a free-for-all. Everyone was just coming from a place of pure creativity," says Shelley de Brauw. With Schroeder-Lebec returning to the band following Dallas Thomas' departure in 2022, this reunified version of Pelican allowed the band to tap back into the spirit of their formative era and build something distinctly new with Flickering Resonance. While longtime Pelican fans will recognize the album as an update to the band's ethos_one that's been constantly evolving since their very first EP_their new partnership with Run For Cover Records emphasizes something that's always been implicit to the Pelican formula. These songs take as much inspiration from titanic `90s post-hardcore, space-rock, and emo as they do traditional metal, showing that though Godflesh and Goatsnake records occupied the shelves of Pelican's songwriters, so too did Quicksand, Christie Front Drive, and Hum. "A lot of people didn't hear it at first," says Schroeder-Lebec. "I was like, well, I guess the metal world is where we fit. But now, we're more willing to acknowledge all the suits we're wearing."On Flickering Resonance, Pelican doesn't attempt to reinvent itself as much as emphasize the elements that were so often overlooked. Though Pelican's thick sonic backbone remains intact, the songs on Flickering Resonance show a more humanistic side of the band. Tracks like "Evergreen" and "Indelible" tease Pelican's doom-metal roots, but these songs feel equally, ebullient and truthful, playing like Texas Is The Reason songs transmuted into a post-rock landscape. Recorded with longtime musical compatriot Sanford Parker, who recorded their first EP, Pelican begins this new chapter of their career with an album that's neither full reinvention nor back-to-roots revivalism. After so much time apart, and with so much life having been lived between the original Pelican lineup's last recording sessions together, the band approached it with renewed vigor and a more communal spirit."There was more room for openness and critique with the understanding that we're all trying to craft the best song possible and that every suggestion is valid until it's proven invalid," says Shelley de Brauw. That process allowed everyone to embrace the material with a shared vision. "We didn't move forward unless we all wanted to move forward, and that felt like real community building," says Schroeder-Lebec of this unified approach. "I went from seeing it as my art and my craft to our craft that we were shaping together."In doing so, Pelican allowed themselves to look at their music less as a means of hard-earned catharsis and more as an appreciation for the glimmers of joy that occur even in the bleakest landscapes. Songs like "Cascading Crescent" and "Indelible" don't languish in what's been lost, these tracks see the band embracing what remains in their hands instead of lamenting what's slipped through their fingers. It's a concept that's mirrored in the artwork of Christian Degn that graces the cover of Flickering Resonance. It's a piece built off the concept of flame meditation, and how the smallest flames can often bring about the biggest transformations. A song like "Flickering Stillness" exemplifies this feeling through its sonic expanse, putting the band's sonic density and hyper-focused clarity on display, but with an emphasis on the profound human connections that have kept Pelican going all these years. "When Laurent left and we were able to carry it through, there became a real sense of gratitude for the fact we still have this artistic outlet and a community of people who want to be a part of it" That feeling of deep, grounded appreciation isn't just one that's within the band members, it's expressed in every track on Flickering Resonance. Because at the very core of Pelican, are four individuals who have grown both separately and together, and always will.Like a distant light faintly glowing in the darkest night, Flickering Resonance is a reminder of all that has passed us by, but also all that is still to come.

Signing with FatCat Records in 2022, and having released four singles to date, Nottingham-based Midnight Rodeo have now delivered their debut album, “Chaos Era”.

Extensive, relentless touring (sold-out hometown shows,The Great Escape, Dot To Dot, and Kendall Calling) created a tight-knit family, their pleasure in playing as an ensemble is instantly evident on the album. When asked about this they’ll explain, “We want people to tap into why we are always smiling on stage.”

The songs are collaborative efforts. Their different musical backgrounds result in a genre criss-crossing and totally unique creative collisions. Bassist Harry says, “What we do is Dada-istic. The drums play hooks, the bass plays parts usually taken by brass, the guitar’s playing West Coast psyche over disco rhythms.”

Written over a prolonged period of time, the songs on the album can be viewed as a kind of coming-of-age “suite”, as the unit of 20-somethings wrestle with subjects such as relationships, shifting social dynamics, changing hopes and dreams. The LP’s title refers to tumultuous personal events they’ve helped each other through. Reinforcing their bonding. With no pointed political agenda, the album is about “escape”. “We want people to dance”, they say.

The band recorded the album with Samana’s Franklin Mockett. Making full use of the acclaimed duo’s residential studio, located deep in the Welsh countryside, during an Indian summer heatwave. The aim was to remove all distractions, and, with Mockett’s assistance, capture the group as live, and as analogue, as possible. For 10 days, in sometimes 16 hour sessions, music, incense, and whiskey flowed, while vintage amp valves glowed.

Just like the band’s live performances, “Chaos Era” is packed with a palpable joy. The exhilaration of creation in each others company. Its punchy production is most definitely meant to be played loud.

Poor Creature is comprised of Ruth Clinton, Cormac MacDiarmada and John Dermody, all three are members of other bands (Landless and Lankum respectively) who have built a large following on re-interpreting songs from the past Songs that have existed for centuries can seem immutable and anchored to time. A new generation of Irish musicians are keen to acknowledge that musical legacy, while reimagining the songs within a contemporary context. Poor Creature's sound - particularly in the context of contemporary Irish folk - offers something unique. There's the gauzy, underwater, almost psychedelic seams of 'Bury Me Not' and 'Adieu Lovely Erin'. 'All Smiles Tonight' and 'Hicks' Farewell' nod to the influence of American folk/bluegrass acts like Doc Watson and the Louvin Brothers. These shifting sounds are made possible by producer John 'Spud' Murphy, who has produced all of Lankum's albums, and worked with Junior Brother, OXN, Pretty Happy, Ye Vagabonds as as well as the final two albums by The Jimmy Cake, with whom John has played for over 20 years. "There's something about the everyday and the fantastical, being entangled, which I think Irish music does so well." This also sums up All Smiles Tonight, moving through stories and loss and history to create an otherworldly and timeless album for the ages.

'Pepper Tree Hill' is, spiritually, our 'Abbey Road' both in album and studio name. It is the place where we feel the most creative, safe to try any crazy idea, and write songs that are both personal and extensions of our creative being. 'Pepper Tree Hill' the album explores our love of the sounds and songs of the Sixties, but in a total Boxmasters way. Legendary trumpeter and Grammy Award winner Herb Alpert is featured on the title track.

On 2018’s “Folk”, New Orleans songwriter and singer Sabine McCalla presents her own interpretation of grass-roots southern music. Combining elements of jazz, country blues, calypso, New Orleans R&B and Haitian creole compas, Sabine spins stories of heartbreak and hope through intimate arrangements and honest inflections. Recorded by Sam Doores (the Deslondes) and Duff Thompson (Mashed Potato Records), “Folk” exposes Sabine’s love of laments and folk spirituals, her penchant for simple truths and her interest in divining fundamental wisdom about love and loss from a small tangle of words. Commanding in its simplicity, with most songs sung a capella or with minimal guitar or vocal accompaniment, the EP’s five songs tell the stories of lost souls and broken hearts, embedded with painful truths that come to us calmly, the ones that are physically and psychically impossible to ignore.

2025 Repress

It's rare that a certain sound is entirely an artist's own. Although undeniably a stew of impeccable influences - from blues to folk to Latin to dusty funk, soul and hip-hop - one cannot hear a Tommy Guerrero song without immediately recognising it as his - and his only.The cult skater from San Francisco is globally renowned as one of the original members of the legendary "Bones Brigade" team. And as an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, his laid-back soul is beloved by all who've basked in its blissful glow.There's something elemental about this music that really stirs the soul. Strikingly beautiful and instantly addictive, it's a kind of funk-fuelled, melody-driven, groove-based magic. There's a serenity and heart in the playing that radiates warmth and splendour, as if crafted for endless sunsets. His albums that surfaced on Mo Wax at the turn of the century have been treasured since their release and it's two of his most vital LPs that we're honoured to reintroduce.The originals were quietly pressed on to a single piece of vinyl so we've worked closely with Tommy this year to bring you these fresh, limited editions. They have been lovingly remastered, cut nice and loud on to heavyweight double vinyl and presented in deluxe gatefold jackets.A Little Bit Of Somethin' is a quietly majestic gem. Brimming with Guerrero's horizontal "loose grooves", these brief but innovative instrumentals demonstrate a rich variety and, as such, comprise an LP that is aptly titled. An enchanting start-to-finish listen, it was instantly regarded as essential upon release via Mo Wax in 2000. It has aged remarkably well.Throughout this inspired collection, simplicity is key. In deploying it, Guerrero presents a beautifully crafted melodic soundscape. The distinctive, mellifluous approach of his guitar style, blending Brazilian, Cuban, Mexican, soul and jazz motifs, is at once startlingly new and tantalisingly familiar. Set against unrushed percussion, the music releases a crystal clear stream of healing frequencies to create a fragile, hypnotic atmosphere.Each track clocks in at around three minutes and, with a lack of studio polish or commitment to traditional song structure, it's a wonder how this enigmatic record demands your attention. However, through its gentle dynamism and impressive playing, it does just that. Whilst resolutely low-key, this lo-fi aesthetic feels genuinely organic and remarkably personal, its powerful intimacy truly connects. It's what makes this album so beloved of those lucky enough to be already familiar with it. From Margaret Kilgallen's truly iconic cover artwork to the music contained within, it's all brilliantly effortless.Guerrero's musical ideas are consistently compelling throughout, making it impossible to select highlights. The album's laconic drift touches upon jazz-fusion workouts and slow-mo hip-hop drums, Tortoise-style experimental post-rock and cinematic sound textures. It's at once hazy, light and bouncy yet sombre and bluesy. The Latin soul of El Chicano blends with the breezy jazz of Grant Green. By employing guitars and drum machines to create a stripped down rhythmic tapestry of spellbinding, addictive songs, there are even traces of The Durutti Column. A little bit of country, a little bit of rock & roll. A Little Bit Of Somethin', indeed.

Domenique Dumont’s fourth album, Deux Paradis, arrives like the three that came before it – with an air of mystery and wonder. This is dance music for inner worlds – rituals, revelations and reveries.
Deux Paradis is a ten-track song cycle that leads the listener through the rhythm of a day, the bloom and fade of a relationship, or even the stages of a life.

It begins with a song about waking up – the candy-striped dub of “Enchantia” – and traces the sun’s arc with the pixelated reggae of “La Vie Va” and the sensuous rush of “Amants Ennemis”. As night falls, the songs take on a twilight quality in the
shimmering pop of “The Order of Invisible Things” and the seductive pulse of “Visages Visages” (a subtle nod to the Desireless classic). There’s also the baroque swoon of “Deux Paradis” and the soft exotica of “Visiteur de la Nuit”. Bolder and richer than before, it’s vintage Domenique Dumont – timeless and romantic, yet laced with an unplaceable sense of longing, like in an Éric Rohmer film. After the instrumental film score People On Sunday (Leaf, 2020) – composed solo by Arturs Liepins – singer Anete Stuce returns to Domenique Dumont, bringing her inimitable joie de vivre. Deux Paradis completes a trilogy of releases alongside Comme Ça (2015) and Miniatures De Auto Rhythm (2018) on the Antinote label.

Deux Paradis was composed, arranged and between 2022 and the end of 2024 in studios in Riga and Paris, and on the Estonian island of Hiiumaa.

Smut is the project of lyricist Tay Roebuck, guitarists Andie Min and Sam Ruschman, drummer Aidan O’Connor, and bassist John Steiner. Roebuck, Ruschman and Min started the band a decade ago in Cincinnati, Ohio. Since then, they’ve played alongside Bully, Wavves, and Nothing. After years in the Cincinnati DIY scene, they made their Bayonet Records full-length debut, How the Light Felt. The record was a revelation. Pitchfork called it “a rigorous, decade-spanning study,” and a “well-oiled spin on late-’80s guitar pop.” Under the Radar called it “pop perfection,” that “blends subtle hooks with wistful lyrics.” It was a record that explored grief through the lens of melancholic dreampop, using drum machines and layered, intricate melodies.
Tomorrow Comes Crashing, Smut's first record with O'Connor and Steiner, sees the band re-energized and trained on the limitless potential that comes with making music with people you love. Galvanized with a new lineup, Smut focused on creating a record that possessed the same towering intensity as the records that first got them into music: Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, Relationship of Command. The outcome is ten of their most intense, bombastic, and focused songs to date.
Catharsis bursts through the seams throughout Tomorrow Comes Crashing. “Syd Sweeney, ”inspired by the actress, is the record's centerpiece. It's about how profoundly strange it can be to be a woman, to be misunderstood by people who don’t even know you. The song is driven by chugging guitars and big, rolling drums. In other words: stadium rock about perception. Paramore meets Dookie. “She connects to the youth and the girls in the water/All she amounts to is someone’s daughter,” sings Roebuck in one particularly poetic moment. The song comes to a thrashing metal-inspired breakdown. It’s ecstatic.
To make the record, Smut recorded “as live as they could,” alongside Aron Kobayashi-Ritch(Momma) in a studio in Red Hook, Brooklyn, over the course of ten days. “We have so much energy right now,” says Roebuck. Right before they went off to New York, Roebuck and Min got married, with the rest of the band by their side. The recording was a true labor of love — driving from Chicago with all their equipment, returning from 12 hour studio days to sleep on friends' couches and floors, Roebuck completely blowing her voice by the end. Smut has always been DIY. Because they love it. Because they have to do it–there’s no other option. Tomorrow Comes Crashing is the culmination of that DIY spirit: making a record that completely encompasses the intensity, moodiness, and emotion of their journey so far.

"World of Pooh immensely brightened the dark corners of San Francisco, California during the years 1983-1990, with their most recognized guise being the MMF trio that existed & thrived during the years 1986-1990. This is the lineup you’ll hear documented on this exceptional collection of 45s, compilation tracks and assorted ephemera. The band has ranged from being a footnote for some (“is that the band Barbara Manning was once in?”) to a fondly-regarded memory for others (“the Land of Thirst album is a forgotten classic”) to a turnstile, door-opening band for still others — like me. They arrived in my life as they were slowly exiting theirs, and I eagerly attended a half-dozen shows of theirs circa 1989-90 around San Francisco moments after I moved there. They were instantly my favorite local band, one I was instantly duty-bound to see whenever & wherever they played. Their jagged and discombobulated take on underground pop music was exceptionally fertile, feral and fetching, and it served as a personal gateway drug that flowered my own appreciation for many different kinds of subtle musical tension.
I also spent at least five glorious years watching Jay Paget, who drummed for World of Pooh and later the Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, ply his rhythmic trade with much aplomb. He was always a steady hand behind the musical wheel of innovative bands who often threatened to careen off course. And I’ll admit to an untoward admiration of (and fascination with) World of Pooh founder, guitarist and singer Brandan Kearney from the moment I met the guy. Not only was he exceptionally friendly and welcoming to a carpetbagging interloper quickly trying to horn in on his scene (me), he was at once one of the most quick-witted, self-deprecating, highly intelligent & musically conversant people I’d ever met. Everything he and his band were doing, along with the mind-boggling DIY gunk he was pushing through his record label, Nuf Sed, and via his multiple other bands (among them: Caroliner & Archipelago Brewing Company, with several more to follow), made me extremely curious and not a tiny bit jealous about these wiser, weirder and musically more daring freaks who were making art, love & war in the relatively grittier & non-gentrified San Francisco of the day.
What I’ve learned in the 35 years since the band broke up is just how highly regarded they were (and remain) by not only those who saw them, but by a now-considerably larger group of humans who’ve subsequently heard & loved their records. I know that their place in the late 1980s was a small but special one, and I’ve seen plenty of online clamoring for more, more, more about this ephemeral and poorly-documented band. And rightly, here it is, lovingly assembled: their two hard-to-come-by 45s, a handful of comp tracks, and a quartet of phenomenal songs just coming to light for the first time, including that Half Japanese cover that dimly existed in my memory as a live song they naturally pulled off with sangfroid, from a time and space when we were all a little younger. - Jay Hinman"

This 14-song full length was originally released by Bloodshot Records in 2018, but because it contains the potent “I Hate Chicago” diss track, it’s sacred writ that the album needs to be on a Windy City record label. So basically, we drew the short straw and now it’s our cross to bear. Laura Jane Grace is best known for fronting indie-punk titans, Against Me!, but on “Bought To Rot” her debut solo album you will hear lullabies and angular rock with influences ranging from The Pixies to Crass. You’ll come to learn about how Laura hates tra‑c and emails, but if you really listen, you’ll hear an album full of love songs. And we hope you really listen and hear that too.

LA-based producer Real Bad Man and Detroit artist ZelooperZ release their joint album Dear Psilocybin via the pro-ducer’s own Real Bad Man Records. The album marks the duo’s first collaboration, culminating in a full-length project that also features guest appearances from Boldy James, MAVI and a verse from The Alchemist. On Dear Psilocybin, ZelooperZ invokes unconventional production out of Real Bad Man to match his own unpredictable and outlandish delivery, working outside of traditional song structures and existing in a lane of his own. The Detroit multihyphenate, who is an integral part of Danny Brown’s Bruiser Brigadecollective and also an accomplished visual artist, painted the album’s corresponding cover artwork as well.

“I definitely haven’t made anything like this before, it’s a very subtle version of my music as far as tone, ” ZelooperZ explained in a conversation with Real Bad Man for his RBM Radio show. He elaborates on the off-kilter approach to the way he recorded to say, “the album feels like a movie soundtrack for a film about a man losing his mind and getting spurts of memories along the way. ”

Speaking about how the project differs from the rest of his collaborative catalog, RBM says, “It’s trippy and it’s a little different – but the main goal was for it to be authentic to Z and his process. ” That dedication to authenticity rings true across his catalog, drawing back to the foundations of his beginnings as a producer, learning the fundamentals of sampling, experimenting with chords and learning to piece songs together by ear. RBM builds a cohesive production arc around each artist he works with, catered to their strengths as artists, working with a variety of lyrical stylists includ-ing Memphis rapper Lukah, Pink Siifu, Blu, Kool Keith, Elcamino & more.

Real Bad Man is the production moniker of visual artist and designer Adam Jay Weissman. A designer and visual artist first, he made his foray into music through his On High Alert series of imaginative, multi-generational compilations, which have featured the likes of Roc Marciano, ROME STREETZ, Pink Siifu, Maxo and more. In the years since, he’s partnered with some of hip-hop’s most talented and adventurous artists on full-length projects, refining and shaping the trajectory of some of rap’s most exciting independent artists.

Kesha’s sixth studio album, . (PERIOD) – yes, it's just a period. – is an unapologetic, unfiltered declaration of artistic freedom and fearless authenticity from the 2x GRAMMY® Award-nominated pop icon. Conceived, co-produced and co-written by Kesha, the 11-song collection transcends pop norms to create a raw, daring, and intensely personal sonic journey, a defiant act of self-expression that refuses to adhere to expectations or play it safe.
More than just a new album, . (PERIOD) is Kesha at her most powerful best, turning her experiences into vibrant, audacious art with a spiked heel at the neck of pop culture.
Among its many exhilarating highlights, . (PERIOD) includes 2024’s blockbuster hits “JOYRIDE” and “DELUSIONAL,” both available everywhere now. Currently boasting over 103M streams at Spotify alone, “JOYRIDE” proved a true sensation since its Independence Day release, reaching #6 on Billboard’s “Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles” and “Hot Dance/Electronic Songs” along with the top 30 on “Pop Airplay” and chart success around the world from the UK to New Zealand. Produced by Zhone and co-written by Kesha, Zhone, and Madison Love, the track marked the triumphant first chapter of a milestone new era for Kesha, celebrating both her long overdue empowerment as an independent artist as well as a powerful sonic evolution following 2023’s critically acclaimed fifth studio album, Gag Order. Along with its popular achievement, “JOYRIDE” has been met by high-profile critical applause from the likes of Rolling Stone, Variety, and Vulture, to name only a few. Perhaps NYLON said it best: “Everything about ‘JOYRIDE’ is a trip…The original glitter-faced party animal of the 2010s is back with a fiery vengeance.”
“JOYRIDE” joined by an equally acclaimed official music video streaming now on YouTube.
Directed by Dimitri Basil (Kylie Minogue, Vance Joy), Cooper Roussel (Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Miami Horror), and Laura Gorun (Joywave, Kings of Leon), the high-octane visual received wide-ranging attention from major publications and top online outlets around the globe, including Billboard, Vulture, and Rolling Stone, the latter of which raved, ““Kesha is taking her foot off the brakes and going full-speed ahead on her new video for ‘JOYRIDE.’ The video sees Kesha racing through the desert in a hot red convertible while being chased by a helicopter, gun-toting assassins, and a shirtless dude hell-bent on catching up to the pop diva.”

Kesha’s sixth studio album, . (PERIOD) – yes, it's just a period. – is an unapologetic, unfiltered declaration of artistic freedom and fearless authenticity from the 2x GRAMMY® Award-nominated pop icon. Conceived, co-produced and co-written by Kesha, the 11-song collection transcends pop norms to create a raw, daring, and intensely personal sonic journey, a defiant act of self-expression that refuses to adhere to expectations or play it safe.
More than just a new album, . (PERIOD) is Kesha at her most powerful best, turning her experiences into vibrant, audacious art with a spiked heel at the neck of pop culture.
Among its many exhilarating highlights, . (PERIOD) includes 2024’s blockbuster hits “JOYRIDE” and “DELUSIONAL,” both available everywhere now. Currently boasting over 103M streams at Spotify alone, “JOYRIDE” proved a true sensation since its Independence Day release, reaching #6 on Billboard’s “Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles” and “Hot Dance/Electronic Songs” along with the top 30 on “Pop Airplay” and chart success around the world from the UK to New Zealand. Produced by Zhone and co-written by Kesha, Zhone, and Madison Love, the track marked the triumphant first chapter of a milestone new era for Kesha, celebrating both her long overdue empowerment as an independent artist as well as a powerful sonic evolution following 2023’s critically acclaimed fifth studio album, Gag Order. Along with its popular achievement, “JOYRIDE” has been met by high-profile critical applause from the likes of Rolling Stone, Variety, and Vulture, to name only a few. Perhaps NYLON said it best: “Everything about ‘JOYRIDE’ is a trip…The original glitter-faced party animal of the 2010s is back with a fiery vengeance.”
“JOYRIDE” joined by an equally acclaimed official music video streaming now on YouTube.
Directed by Dimitri Basil (Kylie Minogue, Vance Joy), Cooper Roussel (Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Miami Horror), and Laura Gorun (Joywave, Kings of Leon), the high-octane visual received wide-ranging attention from major publications and top online outlets around the globe, including Billboard, Vulture, and Rolling Stone, the latter of which raved, ““Kesha is taking her foot off the brakes and going full-speed ahead on her new video for ‘JOYRIDE.’ The video sees Kesha racing through the desert in a hot red convertible while being chased by a helicopter, gun-toting assassins, and a shirtless dude hell-bent on catching up to the pop diva.”

“(Cheer-Accident have) earned a reputation for extreme left turns - following collections of complex, metallic art rock with albums stuffed with piano-driven balladry cementing a practice of defying expectations that’s endured for more than three or four decades, depending on when you recognize as the group's actual genesis” - THE WIRE

From Cheer-Accident's liner notes: It’s weird to have so few words to say about our best album to date, but… well…

Our Best Album? Out of 26?

That’s not nothing.

What makes it “our best?” Is it the songs? Is it the production? Is it the convergence of those two elements? What if we added “accessibility?” It is, after all, a pop album. You know, very much in the same way that “The Why Album” and “What Sequel?” are. In fact, we very nearly named it “Now What”, viewing it as the final installment in this pop trilogy.

But that started to feel wrong, because: Why get locked into a “series” every time we happen to lean on the more melodic and concise aspect of what we do?

You know, and the thing is, this isn’t any kind of “return.” This is something new. Though it certainly shares DNA with the aforementioned What/Why releases, it also very much incorporates the rock and dissonance and experimentation present in many of our other forays. Maybe this is simply where we landed. Maybe this is what we are now. Maybe we’ve finally found the combination of ingredients that so perfectly synthesize as our aesthetic that there’s no need to go on from here. Maybe we’ve stopped. Maybe we’re done. Maybe we’ve finally found that sweet spot between the “adventurous” and the “palatable,” and we now intend to rest on our laurels.

What an Admission that would be.

Since first forming in 2016, London's High Vis have steadily polished their palette of progressive hardcore with shades of post-punk, Brit pop, neo-psychedelia, and even Madchester groove, mapping a middle ground between hooks and fury, melodies and mosh pits. Singer Graham Sayle describes their third album 'Guided Tour' as an axis of competing forces: "It's trying to be a hopeful record, while also being incensed." Rounded out by drummer Edward 'Ski' Harper, guitarists Martin MacNamara and Rob Hammaren, and bassist Jack Muncaster, the band's deep roots in the UK and Irish DIY hardcore scenes have kept them grounded but growing, inspired equally by restlessness and righteous anger. As Sayle puts it, "Everyone's scratching, everyone's working all the time, and their idea of relaxing is just getting fucked and avoiding reality. This album is an escape from that."From its opening seconds of a cab door slamming, a car revving away, and a baggy rhythm swinging to life, 'Guided Tour' sounds like a band reaching for new heights, bristling with energy. Recorded across a few weeks at Holy Mountain Studios in London with producer Jonah Falco and engineer Stanley Gravett, the results feel dynamic and dialed-in, like anthems burned into sense memory through sweat and repetition. Harper cuts to the chase: "We had a clear idea going in, every moment got used. Maybe when we're 60 we can sit around and get a drum sound right, but for now it's about getting things done."The album's 11 songs span the spectrum of contemporary guitar music, sharpened by experience, camaraderie, and societal frustrations. From swaggering street punk ("Drop Me Out," "Mob DLA") to jangling indie sneer ("Worth The Wait," "Deserve It") to heavy alt ("Feeling Bless," "Fill The Gap") to shoegazey spoken word ("Untethered"), the group's chemistry transmutes any style to their unique intensity. Sayle champions this evolving fusion: "For years coming from hardcore, we had pretty clear boundaries - other scenes were separate worlds. Now things are getting more blended, drawing from different places."Nowhere is this sentiment flexed more boldly than on "Mind's A Lie," a dance- punk anthem inspired by Harper's love of house, garage, and pirate radio. Stabs of sampled female vocals (by celebrated South London singer and DJ Ell Murphy) build into a razor wire rhythm of low-slung bass, tense drums, and sparkling guitar before Sayle's staunch voice starts barking harsh truths ("Face to face with all I've known / I can't call these thoughts my own"). After a sudden breakdown, the track regroups and takes off, cruising into the horizon in a haze of chiming guitars and Murphy's ascendant voice, from the streets to somewhere beyond.

When Alanis Morissette took direct aim at an ex who wronged her on the eviscerating “You Oughta Know” in 1995, everything about the Top 10 song communicated it wasn’t the usual narrative about love gone south. Or the typical wounded singer wallowing in self pity. Morissette, and both the lead single from and her entire American major-label debut — the profoundly personal Jagged Little Pill — represented a sea change. They kickstarted a movement, one whose impact continues to echo throughout the mainstream nearly three decades later.

Ranked the 69th Greatest Album of All Time by Rolling Stone, included on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s list of 200 Definitive Albums, and featured in several books about essential albums, Jagged Little Pill remains more than a blockbuster that has sold more than 17 million copies in the U.S. and 33 million units worldwide. It’s a statement, an attitude, a soundtrack for anyone seeking inspiration, an outlet, or permission to be themselves.

Sourced from the original master tapes, pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing on MoFi SuperVinyl, and strictly limited to 4,000 numbered copies, Mobile Fidelity’s UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP box set of Jagged Little Pill presents the landmark effort in audiophile-grade sound for the first time. A key part of the record’s appeal and accessibility — Glen Ballard’s smooth production, touches that help Morissette’s exposed-nerve fare seem more accessible and melodic — comes through on this special 30th anniversary edition with an openness, presence, and dynamic explosiveness that make the vocalist’s songs that much more real and visceral.

The singer’s distinctive mezzo-soprano deliveries — the octave-rippling highs, dark-hued lows, dramatic crescendos, belted choruses, wispy reflections, occasional yodels — resonate with full-range ardor and depth. As crucial as anything on the record, Morissette’s confessional words take center stage like never before. Ditto the instrumentation and atmospherics that form the magnetic backgrounds of the songs. Key in on the contributions from Red Hot Chili Peppers Dave Navarro and Flea on “You Oughta Know” to Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers' co-founder Benmont Tench’s organ playing on six tracks.

The deluxe packaging of Mobile Fidelity’s Jagged Little Pill UD1S set underscores the work’s distinguished status. Housed in a slipcase, the LPs come in special foil-stamped jackets with faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendor of the recording. Benefitting from an ultra-low noise floor, superior groove definition, and dead-quiet surfaces, this UD1S reissue is for listeners who prize sound quality and desire to engage themselves in everything involved with the album, including the now-iconic cover art that juxtaposes two portraits of the then-21-year-old singer-songwriter and features typewriter font.

That script — which suggests a raw, blood-on-the-floor document created without modern aids like spell check or language correction — hints at the heightened level of unvarnished intimacy, honesty, and catharsis Morissette offers throughout Jagged Little Pill. Named after a phrase uttered on the astute “You Learn,” the album explores the frank emotions, inherent contradictions, and wishful desires people feel everyday but are often too afraid to express. Morissette displays no such fear or shyness.

Akin to a woman reading from a diary, Morissette leaves nothing to the imagination as she skewers hypocrisy during the poignant “Forgiven,” seeks recompense on the vengeful “You Oughta Know,” and spills her guts on the soul-purging “All I Really Want.” For all the anger and bile ascribed to the singer and record, Jagged Little Pill is incredibly healthy and upbeat. Morissette uses the catchy pop-rock frameworks and moody ambience to suss out situations, to learn, to give hope. There’s the clever yearning of “Hand in My Pocket”; wry contrarianism of “Ironic”; kind-heartedness of “Hand over Feet”; the live-and-let-live spirit of “You Learn” – all positive and amiable.

Throughout Jagged Little Pill, the ever-approachable Morissette connects with listeners who recognize themselves in her — and has an intelligent conversation with anyone who wants to participate. It seemed almost everyone did. In addition to the mammoth sales that make the effort the 17th-best-selling album in American history, Jagged Little Pill collected four Grammy Awards, two American Music Awards, three Billboard Music Awards, and eight Juno Awards. In 2018, the record became the basis for a musical that netted 15 Tony nominations on Broadway.

Ironic? Anything but. Jagged Little Pill transcends generations, gender, and trends. As Morissette sings on the opening “All I Really Want,”, the album represents “deliverance” — “a place to find common ground.”

Max Schreiber is the more introspective guise of Mule Driver, reserved for drifting into fragile and haunted sonic territories. Variations on Memory Vol.2 deepens Schreiber’s exploration of collective sound and personal distortion.

This time, fragments of lullabies and children’s songs resurface along side memorial songs—distorted by time, memory, and a quiet sense of unease. Schreiber treats these melodies not as sacred relics, but as raw material: vulnerable to noise, decay, and reinterpretation.

Recorded in intuitive, often single-take sessions, the album challenges the listener’s sense of nostalgia. Sentimentality collapses into abstraction, and familiar tunes unravel into drifting soundscapes—like half-remembered scenes from a film that never existed.

Variations on Memory Vol. 2 is less about what these songs once meant, and more about what they might conceal.

REPRESS

New Delhi-based Peter Cat Recording Co. will release their debut album, ‘Bismillah’ on June 14, 2019 via French independent label Panache Records. Debut UK live shows are soon also to be announced by the band.


Peter Cat Recording Co. could almost have a question mark on the end of its name. Not least as founder & frontman Suryakant Sawhney refuses to explain where that name really comes from or what it means (perhaps a reference to the Tokyo jazz club owned by Haruki Murakami), but also since the very existence of the band itself raises a raft of questions. When was the last time we fell for an indie rock band for the right reasons? Not because the band in question nostalgically imitate a perceived ‘golden age’ but because they innately embody the fundamentals of such music: fantasy, sincerity and the freedom to make music without rules or career aspi- rations. And when was the last time this kind of band sounded like Sinatra, Barry White, the sweetest doo-wop, humid fanfares and a psychedelic wedding band, all at once? And all of this coming from India?
In truth, the story of Peter Cat Recording Co. was written within the triangle of San Francisco, Delhi and Paris.
In the first of these cities, Sawhney (a native of Delhi) pitched up to study film-making. More distracted by the city’s peaking live scene of the early noughties, this is where he started to make music and to sketch out an idea for the band.“
The people I lived with supported my idea of writing music, they introduced me to great mu-
sic. There used to be a great garage scene in San Francisco, like The Oh Sees also Ty Seagall, Mikal Conin, all those bands. This is a world I had never seen in my entire life. A big inspiration from San Francisco was that you could record yourself. You don’t need to be in a studio and spend a lot of money to make an album. You can do it”.


At the end of the 2000s, Suryakant returned home to New Delhi, and started his band for real, more or less the same band that plays today. “I wasn’t so concerned about will we be performing, will we be the greatest band, will we be trendy. I just wanted to make something that was consequential and important for us, I think. Something which would last, something people could listen to and be like « this is life changing ». It was for the sake of beauty”.


For the first few years and in India alone, this is exactly what Peter Cat Recording Co. did, in total indifference to the rest of the world. This was until young Parisian label Panache stumbled across the band online via Vice’s THUMP subsidiary, stupefied by the band’s cosmic video for seven-minutes-and-counting track, ‘Love De- mons’. And so in spring of 2018, ‘Portrait Of A Time: 2010-2016’ was released on Panache - making the first international release from Peter Cat Recording Co., bizarrely enough, an anthology of re-mastered, hidden gems from the band’s ramshackle back catalogue, previously recorded in Suryakant’s own living room. With Peter Cat’s off-kilter charm hitherto unheard of beyond the fringes of India, the release provided a gateway op-
Whilst the title track found its way onto Tracks Of The Year lists at the Guardian & NME, it was tricky for new PCRC enthusiasts to get a firm grip on the startling push/pull between the immediate, uncanny music this release gathered, and the cultural backdrop of New Delhi at which it was so startlingly at odds.


Opportunity for a wider fanbase to fall in love with their cloud-like, drunken songs for the first time.
If discovering your favourite new band via a ‘Best Of’ feels a curious premise, then ‘Bismillah’ does more than hint towards the promise of Peter Cat Recording Co’s future. Blending gypsy jazz, psychedelic cabaret, space disco, bossa supernova, Bollywood and uneasy listening with kaleidoscopic ease, in many senses, the band’s knack hasn’t altered. Always different, paradoxical, unpredictable yet somehow familiar. The new album opens to the strains of bird chatter, the whisper of a city’s soundscape and the first few notes from an instrument which seem to be calling us to the departure lounge, a fore-shadow of the flight ‘Bismillah’ launches its listener
on. Suryakant sings with the detached, rueful elegance of Sinatra marooned on a desert island, whilst his band create small space-time capsules which navigate their way through genres and eras – including the future – and between nostalgia and eccentricity.


Peter Cat recently trailed ‘Bismillah’ with the release of ‘Floated By’, an appositely titled musing on failure & missed opportunities, punctuated by the fulsome brass section which weaves through so much of the album.


The languid, blue quality to the track is offset by the attendant music video, created with footage shot, implau- sibly enough, at Suryakant’s own marriage ceremony (needless to say, the wedding band hired for the day was of course, Peter Cat Recording Co.) Sawhney dryly notes; “Hopefully it’s not a many-a-times-in-a-lifetime event. You can’t fake that set, those people actually having a good time, being really emotional and intense.” ‘Bismillah’’s colour-drenched album cover also captures Suryakant’s father-in-law making his wedding toast on that same day - a nod back towards the cover of ‘Portrait Of A Time’, itself a black & white image taken at the wedding ceremony of Suryakant’s own father.


A stumbling but gracious collection of songs rooted in a kind of drunken soul music, the melancholy nature of some of the songs on ‘Bismillah’ renders them almost liquid, before they develop into more dance-like shapes. Suryakant’s rangy voice swoops from the falsetto glide of ‘I’m This’ to the beat-up baritone blown along by the warm breeze of ‘Soulless Friends’. The elliptical structure of album opener ‘Where The Money Flows’ also al-
lows for the use of brief bursts of autotune effect on his vocal without feeling incongruous, whilst the desultory lyrics of ‘Heera’ (a Hindi word for diamond) - sharing something with the Morricone school of grand storytelling - have an emotional weight that would impress even coming from a native English speaker. Perhaps the most gleefully unpredictable moment on ‘Bismillah’ comes with the illusory, vocal loops on the intro to ‘Memory Box’, errupting into 8 exhilarating minutes worth of unbridled, string-backed disco joy. A cat might have nine lives, but on ‘Bismillah’ and beyond, Peter Cat Recording Co. are hinting towards an un- knowable multitude of dimensions. Throw them all together, and it equates less to a listening experience and more to an out-of-body experience.


Peter Cat Recording Co. are: Suryakant Sawhney (vocals/guitar/organ), Dhruv Bhola (bass), Kartik S Pillai (organ/guitar/electronics), Rohit Gupta (horns), Karan Singh (drums)

Santana Bridges the Divide Between Live and Studio Material on Moonflower: 1977 Double Album Features Extraordinary Performances, Soulful Vibes, and Dynamic Mix of Latin, Rock, Funk, and Blues
Sourced from the Original Master Tapes and Strictly Limited to 3,000 Numbered Copies: Mobile Fidelity’s 180g 33RPM 2LP Set Plays with Audiophile-Quality Detail, Balance, and Imaging
1/4” / 15 IPS original analogue non-Dolby master to DSD 256 to analogue console to lathe



Though it may seem strange now, Moonflower stood for nearly 15 years as Santana’s first and only live record released in the United States. This despite the fact that roughly half of the double album consists of new studio songs, including a zesty cover of the Zombies classic “She’s Not There” that reached the Top 30 of the singles charts.

However unconventional, the “split” strategy went over like gangbusters. Moonflower reached the Top 10 of the Billboard Top 200 and achieved double-platinum status — feats the group would not again replicate for 22 years. These, and the beautiful quality of the program itself, are among the reasons why the 1977 effort remains viewed by critics and fans alike as must-have Santana.

Sourced from the original master tapes, pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing in California, housed in a Stoughton jacket, and strictly limited to 3,000 numbered copies, Mobile Fidelity’s 180g 33RPM 2LP set of Moonflower presents the record in audiophile sound for the first time on a domestic reissue. Part of the MoFi’s Santana catalog restoration series, this collectible version features quiet surfaces and black backgrounds that expose the critical details, liquid tones, and dynamic interplay central to Santana’s music.

The enhanced sonics extend not only to Carlos Santana’s six-string wizardry, but to the rhythmic, melodic, and vocal elements that course throughout both the studio and live cuts on Moonflower. The grip and depth of the bass lines; the wash of the organ; the scope and carry of the vocals; the extension and weight of the low-end frequencies; the rich textures of the guitars, percussive devices, and keyboards: all appear amid wide, balanced soundstages and image with right-sized dimensionality.

Significantly rooted in the styles and approaches that inform the group’s first three records, Moonflower captures the final appearances of iconic percussionist Jose “Chepito” Areas and go-to keyboardist Tom Coster on a Santana album. As he did during the preceding five-year stretch, Coster inhabits a large role here, sharing songwriting credits on a majority of the new cuts and helping steer the arrangements toward spiritually minded albeit concise directions that encompass vibrant Latin, rock, and blues themes that began to escape the ensemble shortly after his departure.

Close your eyes and feel the warmth of the sun on the R&B-kissed “I’ll Be Waiting,” anchored by Carlos Santana’s gliding fretwork and Greg Walker’s creamy vocals. Enter the cosmic universe of “Zulu,” on which Coster’s nimble phrasing opens the gate to polyrhythmic beats, knotty grooves, and interlocking funk. Grab the album cover and drift off to paradise amid the equally evocative “Flor d’Luna (Moonflower),” a romantic slow dance that Carlos Santana ensures tiptoes en route to its blissful destination. Channeling a different spirit animal, the guitarist later lets loose on the hard-hitting “El Morocco,” on which he seemingly engages in a shootout with himself and wades into the rippling psychedelia that elevated the band’s early material.

Speaking of the past, Moonflower triumphs on that level as well. In more ways than one, the live selections — and the caliber of the performances — chosen for inclusion represent an abbreviated greatest-hits survey of the band up to that point. And, at the very least, a convincing argument about why Santana had progressed into one of the most formidable bands you could hope to see on a stage in the mid ‘70s.

Simultaneously representative and illustrative of the group’s breadth, tracks stem from the collective’s eponymous debut, Abraxas, and Santana III as well as the then-more recent Amigos and Festival. Whether you fall for the sidewinding spell of a spicy rendition of “Black Magic Woman/Gypsy Queen,” lose your head to the positively epic momentum of “Soul Sacrifice/Head, Hands & Feet,” or keep dropping the needle on the savory grace of the brilliant reading of “Europa (Earth’s Cry Heaven’s Smile),” this pressing of Moonflower puts you — and Santana’s first-chapter legacy — in good hands.

"Chasing the funky symphonies that filled my head and my dreams..."

December 25th, 2023 - an Instagram post. Stimulator Jones shared half a dozen FIRE tracks from his beat tape archive. We were immediately drawn to the rough hewn boom bap.

"I'd release that", Rob commented.

Hours of material was shared and the result is this: Cool Green Trees (1999-2005). A collection of beats and loops Stimulator Jones created between the ages of 14-20 at home in his basement, bedroom and computer room in Roanoke, Virginia.

You will not believe the profound soulful genius contained within these naive schoolboy melodies.

December 25th, 1998 - 25 years ago to the day and his much-coveted Yamaha SU10 sampler was finally bestowed upon young Stimmy AKA Sam Lunsford: "I immediately hooked up a CD Walkman to the input jack and looped the beginning two bars of Grover Washington Jr.'s "Mercy Mercy Me". I don't know what exactly was so thrilling about hearing two measures of music repeating over and over but it was so infectious and hypnotizing and enthralling to me. I'll never forget that ecstatic rush of making my first loop - an uncontrollable, gleeful smile plastered all over my face." When you hear the pocket breakbeat symphonies featured here on Cool Green Trees, you'll feel the same sense of frisson.

In the wake of his Stones Throw breakthrough - Exotic Worlds & Master Treasures - Stimulator Jones was pegged by many as a 90s throwback artist. However, he literally IS a 90s artist. He's been recording music most of his life and he's now 40. He created the bulk of Cool Green Trees as a teenager. Everything before 2004 was recorded when Sam was still in school. He was in 8th grade when he made the 1999 tracks - he didn't even have his learner's permit. This album is a snapshot of a young man in a simpler time. Things were still mysterious back then and he was flying blind, relying on his ears and having to figure things out for himself: "I had no road map for becoming a beatmaker. I have been collecting music since I was a kid, I am a lifelong digger and seeker of cool and interesting sounds. I was there in the golden age of Hip Hop, and while I may have been a suburban white kid in Roanoke, Virginia, I was tuned in and I bought so many classic albums when they came out. I was attracted to Hip Hop because of the musical and poetic quality. I was hypnotized by the rhythms, partially because I was a drummer. I didn't brag about collecting my breakbeat records or making beats - it was something I did in isolation. It wasn't something I generally wanted to bring attention to and it didn't really score me any cool points. I certainly wasn't flexing on social media about it."

Hell, he can do that now!

Opener "Pharoah Jones" was inspired by Yesterday's New Quintet and Madlib's ability to capture that classic 70s sound whilst playing all the instruments. Sam created this one stoned afternoon by laying down a 2 bar loop and a shaker loop on his Yamaha SU700 sampler. He hung a microphone from the ceiling and played his Yamaha Stage Custom drum kit over the top before adding ender Rhodes and playing his dad's Selmer tenor sax through an Electro Harmonix Memory Man echo pedal. Yes! Up next, "Ghost Gospel" utilises a dope loop from a gospel record and adds some soul-funk drums overtop, whilst working that filter knob. Says Sam: "The loop reminded me of something Ghostface would rap over. The sample was in 3/4 waltz time but I flipped it for a 4/4 groove, a technique I picked up from RZA. "Ill Feeling" uses sped-up pieces from a dusty old funk record and putting them over a classic NOLA drum loop; gain chopping up a slow, bluesy 3/4 time signature and bending it to a 4/4 groove. Classy shit. "Capital Punishment" features drums tapped in live, inspired by MF Doom's Special Herbs series. "Do Not Adjust" consists loops found on a compilation of 70s French music at Happy's Flea Market, a classic Roanoke digging spot.

The sublime, evocative title track, "Cool Green Trees" was created when Sam was still living at home. He dumped samples off his SU10 into the family desktop and arranged them in a demo version of Pro Tools: "This track was sort of my ode to the DJ Shadow style of sample based production. Super spacey, slow, and moody. The heavily filtered drums were inspired by Alec Empire's 'Low on Ice' album. I later added some scratches and sounds from a Spider Man storybook record." "Chill Scratch" snags the final bit of a bossanova record and pairs it with a drum loop before adding experimental scratching run through an Electro Harmonix Memory Man echo pedal. "Poisonous Fumes" was made using a sampler, mixer and a turntable; a kind of mixtape beat collage with added scratches and sounds from various records. Using dialogue from superhero records was a nod to Madlib. "Welcome Aboard The Starship" is dark, downtempo trip-hop with a spooky bent. Sam paired a slow, hard drum loop with a guitar sample grabbed off a psychedelic rock record. To finish, he added various backwards sounds and weird atmospheric effects and a little scratching. Swoon.

Side B opens with "Keep On Runnin", made on a borrowed Roland SP202 sampler. Having always loved the sound of the Lo-Fi filter on those machines, reminiscent of the Emu SP1200, Sam always imagined Del or another of the Hieroglyphics crew rapping over this beat. You can certainly hear why. "Sounds Impossible" sees Sam experimenting with layering multiple kick samples at different volumes to create patterns similar to those heard by Showbiz and Lord Finesse during their God-level 1995 period. "Painted Faces" was made by chopping up a REDACTED record which he had gotten from Happy's Flea Market and paired it with a REDACTED drum loop. By the time Sam recorded "The Knew Style", he had acquired a shitty old 1960s portable turntable off eBay. It didn't function properly when he bought it but his brother opened it up, cleaned it out and got it working: "I remember he told me that there was a bunch of sand inside of it when he opened it up, as if its previous owner had taken it to the beach. I would take that turntable on my Happy's Flea Market digs so I could preview records...that's how I found this loop."

"Chicken Wing Blues Sauce" loops up a classic blues joint and pairs it with some REDACTED drums. A bit of filtering and arranging et voilà! "Kool Breeze", from 1999, is one of Sam's oldest surviving beats, as is "Sexx Bullets". The Roots sampled the same record, leaving Sam frustrated yet vindicated. "Soul Child" was an early SU10 creation, looping a dusty old Soul Children 45 and pairing it with 70s rock drum loops to great effect. "Take Off Runnin" was another loop found digging with a portable turntable. Paired with some boom bap drums it makes for a hypnotic head-nod groove. "Centurian" was intended to be a little beat interlude a la Pete Rock. The sample is from a sun-dappled soft-psych record and it's paired with a Robin Trower drum loop that just happens to fit perfectly. Sometimes you slap things together kind of haphazardly and magic happens. "Bozack" was the first beat Sam made using Pro Tools, his first foray into using chopped sounds instead of loops, an exciting new world. "Church" is beat interlude using a Phil Upchurch loop with the "Long Red" drums - a favourite break of Dilla et al. Sam was really on a tear in late 2004, probably because he was unemployed and phoneless and able to just make beats all day. He made "Splash One" on a borrowed Yamaha SU700 and again was experimenting with tapping the drums in live with his fingers, instead of using a loop or sequenced pattern. Channeling 9th Wonder, Sam used a water splash sound effect from a Batman record as a percussive element, hence the title (also a 13th Floor Elevators reference). The main loop is a backwards portion of one of his favourite Roy Ayers songs.

"Hank" is another fun little beat interlude thing, created on a borrowed Roland SP202 sampler with the fantastic Lo-Fi effect that resembled the Emu SP1200 at a fraction of the price. "73 goatee", from 99, is another of his oldest surviving beats, created in his bedroom with his Yamaha SU10 and his brother's Vestax MR-300 4-track recorder: "This one will always feel special. I can remember having a feeling all the way back then on the night that I created it that this was a solid beat with a catchy loop. There was something in the Fender Rhodes melody that resonated with me emotionally, and I had never heard a producer sample that portion before. I felt like I had found my own unique sound, my own unique loop. It came from an Ahmad Jamal '73. I actually even recorded myself rapping and scratching over this beat way back then, I still have that version in all its imperfect sloppy glory."

Sam explains just how much these tracks mean to him: "They all have immense historical and sentimental value and I'm proud of them. These beats come from an innocent, simple time when I was just figuring out how to craft these sounds. They're something very personal to me. They are the initial part of a journey that I really was taking *alone*. There was no YouTube. I couldn't Google shit. I didn't even know any other beatmakers, producers or DJs in my town that could teach me anything. It was always just me, alone, in a room with some equipment - chasing the funky symphonies that filled my head and my dreams. What I was doing wasn't cool. Most of my peers thought I was a weirdo and couldn't care less. Creating these sounds was an anti-social endeavour. In a sense, I felt like it was me against the world, and all I had to instruct and assist me were the recordings produced by my heroes - RZA, DJ Premier, Erick Sermon, Beatminerz, Showbiz, Diamond D, Beatnuts, Prince Paul, The Bomb Squad, Pete Rock, Q-Tip, E-Swift, Mista Lawnge, DJ Shadow, Cut Chemist, Peanut Butter Wolf, El-P and so many more...I dedicate this collection to them, and to my older brother Joe who has always been a musical and technical guiding light for me.

This was a time before every kid was a self-described producer and beatmaker, before everyone had a DAW, before Kanye and "chipmunk soul", before Red Bull beat battles, before there was any social media beyond chat rooms and AOL Instant Messenger, before Soundcloud, before SP-404 mania, before lo-fi beats to study to, before Splice, before targeted ads for MIDI chord packs, etc. In 99 when I told people that I had a sampler and made beats I was mostly met with bewildered confusion and indifference. Kids and adults alike would wonder why I got this weird machine for Christmas instead of something worthwhile like a Playstation or a mountain bike or even a guitar for that matter because at least that could be used to make "real music". Back then, sampling was still not widely respected as an art form - it was seen as lazy, talentless and unoriginal at best and outright criminal theft at worst. I had gotten respect for playing drums and guitar and things of that nature but this was a step in the wrong direction in the eyes of many."

The cover photo is a picture of Sam standing on his back porch in the latter part of 1998, just before he got his first sampler. He was 13 years old, in 8th grade. His dad took the picture with his 35mm film camera: "I actually wanted to be pointing my dad's .22 pistol at the camera lens but he wouldn't let me. He gave me an old walking cane to use instead. The Tommy Hilfiger puffer jacket came from the lost and found at William Fleming High School where my mom worked as a secretary. I was thrilled when she brought it home because we never spent money on expensive name brand clothing like that - we were for the most part strictly a sale rack, bargain bin, thrift store, yard sale, flea market kind of family when it came to clothes. My watch is some cheap off-brand fake gold department store watch." Mastering for this vinyl edition was overseen by Be With regular Simon Francis and it was cut by the esteemed Cicely Balston at Abbey Road Studios to be pressed in the Netherlands by Record Industry.